Polo Da Don was who Stefano Langone worked with on Stevie Wonder’s “Lately.” At the beginning of the song, Stefano hit quite the rough patch. He did manage to pull out a couple of nice sounding notes, when the arrangement took a turn into the disco era. To be honest, I thought the remix on the song was weird. I still don’t entirely understand how Stefano got a second chance at the Wild Card, let alone being put through to the Top 13. But, he’s probably got the young girls’ vote on lock, considering he looks like a post-pubescent David Archuleta, just minus the vocal ability.
Karen Rodriguez worked with Jim Jonsin on Selena’s “I Could Fall In Love.” The way Karen talks about her love for Selena and her music, while interchanging Selena’s name with Jennifer Lopez’s name, leads me to believe that she doesn’t entirely grasp the fact that they are indeed two separate people. But, maybe that’s just me.
Karen’s vocal performance last night was bad. There’s no sugar coating my way around this one, folks. It was go-home-and-pack-up-your-Selena-dolls bad. There’s no possible way Karen is not going to be taking a trip to the bottom three tonight.
Baby lock them doors, I mean, Scotty McCreery worked with Don Was on “The River” by Garth Brooks. I think Randy summed it up best last night when he told Scotty, “If it ain’t broke, don’t even consider thinking about fixing it.” I definitely agree, because Scotty is on a roll. I would love to see him challenge himself next week with an upbeat country number.
Closing out the show was Naima Adedapo who worked with Tricky Stewart on Rihanna’s huge hit “Umbrella.” Tricky originally produced the track with Rihanna, and he re-worked the track for Naima.
Now this may be an unpopular opinion, but I thought Naima’s performance was pretty good. I thought she started out very strong vocally, and breaking it down reggae twist was just awesome. Now, she did have some pitch problems after the reggae part, due to the dancing, and not balancing her breathing properly. But damn, I thought her performance was all kinds of awesome.
Article comments
1 - Butch
Best of night: Stefano. Reminded me of Elliot Yamin. He picked a tough song to sing, but turned in an incredible effort that sounded great.
Ashton was so flat, it sounded like she was singing the song a half step lower than the band. Horrible.
Paul McDonald almost literally made me ill. This guy should be Vote For the Worst's pick. Yeah, his singing voice is weird but that doesn't make it good.
Jacob Lusk should be VFTW's pick after McDonald is sent packing. This kid has a lot of spirit, but his style is tacky, garish, and entirely lacking in taste.
Durbin surprised me at how decent he was on the McCartney tune. But the way he directed the crowd's applause level after his performance? What an arrogant ass.
Casey Abrams. I'm sorry he's having health problems. He's got a lot of talent. But I think he is trying too hard with all the yelling. But his non-yelling voice is not really very distinctive. I hope his health improves.
Scotty did good, right now I could see him winning the whole thing. But yeah, I agree he needs to try something a little more uptempo.
2 - Butch
Oh yeah - for to mention: it's Charlie ChapLIN.
3 - Kirsten
Oh, I know. Just caught that myself. I'm waiting for an edit.
4 - handyguy
I correctly predicted the bottom 3 tonight, something I have a rather spotty record doing. The thing is, there were no really bad performances for the most part -- just un-thrilling ones.
Casey and James were the outstanding performers this week. ["In the hospital" sounds serious...what's up with Casey? He has a better than reasonable chance of winning this year, so it was disturbing news.]
The new Entertainment Weekly [written before this week's performances] picked Casey, Lauren and Scotty as the front-runners. I would put James in second place at this point. [And Jacob is still probable Top 5 material. Butch and Kirsten underestimate him, I think.]
And yes, Scotty's easy to like, but isn't he basically just doing a surprisingly deft recreation of deep-voiced country stars twice [or more] his age? Brad Paisley he's not. Did you notice they couldn't find a solo spot for him in the Michael Jackson medley tonight? He doesn't have to be able to do Broadway or Motown, but he does need to show some originality and range and get outside his comfort zone.
And the females need to kick it up a notch. Still too much competent boringness.
5 - Kirsten
From what I've read tonight, when Casey gets stressed, his stomach starts bleeding? Sounds like an ulcer. He tweeted from the hospital a little while ago saying that he was feeling a bit better.
6 - Sherry
Hollywood Reporter is saying Casey has Ulcerative Colitis. Hopefully he can keep it under control for the competition. That's a tough one to deal with for a lot of people.
7 - handyguy
Wow, ulcerative colitis at age 20. He seems so carefree on the surface....but of course live TV performances could stress out anybody. He had to have blood transfusions! I'm worried.
8 - Sherry
Yes, it is worrisome. His age is common for people with UC. It often strikes people in their 20's. Not sure how long he's had it of course.
9 - Sherry
Of even if actually does have I should say. That's just what I saw reported.